Success in the first experiment to produce human organs in pigs – Hypertext

this is the initial embryo mixture of pigs and humans, which could be used to manufacture organs for transplants. Source: Juan Carlos Izpisúa (Cell)

A group of scientists has completed the first successful experiment to manufacture human organs in pigs. Their findings, published in the journal Cell, show that it is feasible to create embryos mix of pigs and humans, a critical step that opens the door to the future of transplantation. Chimeras, from which Homer’s imagine as mythological monsters, you are a step closer to revolutionize medicine.

Have created the first embryonic mix of pigs and humans

"The idea of creating human organs and tissues using chimeric human-pig has been floating in the air for a few years", explains to Hypertext Dr. Aida Platero, the Salk Institute of California. In 2010, the group of Dr. Nakauchi was demonstrated in a study published in Cell that it was possible to generate a pancreas of a rat on the inside of a mouse. The following year, another team managed to manufacture a thymus of rat in the body of a mouse. The chimeras interspecies transplants began to be a reality, but the challenge was to achieve this with human cells.

mythological monsters to the future of transplantation

To create these embryos mix of pigs and humans, the group of Dr. Juan Carlos Izpisúa injected a type of stem cells of human origin in embryos of pigs. The aim was that the animals incorporating these cells and they could do that diferenciasen properly during embryonic development. Their results show “the first evidence of the capacity of contribution to chimeric human cells in embryos of pig,” says Platero. However, as warns the researcher, “we are still far away of making real human organs inside of pigs.”

This type of chimeras could help to make human organs in animals

“it Is possible that the experiments of production of chimeras, interspecies, we may think that touches upon the science fiction, will soon become a reality”, explains Hypertext the Dr. Lluis Montoliu, the National Center of Biotechnology (CNB-CSIC). The idea of developing chimeras between different species, however, is not new. Since the seventies, the group of Dr. Nicole Le Douarin created chimeras between chick embryos and quail to investigate processes that are essential in the embryonic development of vertebrates. After the success of the first chimeras of mice and rats to hypothetical transplant, the team Izpisúa tried, without success, to perform the same experiment between mice and pigs.

unable To do so, the scientists injected a type of stem cell, known as human cells inducible pluripotent, in embryos of pigs and cows that were not going to be implanted in a female. Later they managed to inject stem cells of human origin in porcine embryos, which were implanted in a female pig, leaving it to develop for four weeks. To analyze the different parts of the embryo, detected some human cells that, although implemented with very low efficiency, yes seemed to be able to be incorporated into an embryo of a different species during development.

“It’s a partial success remarkable although still very far from an application to biomedical,” says Montoliu. The paper, published in the journal Cell demonstrates that stem cells are able to colonize very weak, although detectable, the embryo “host” of pork in development. The goal, as explained by the own Izpisúa in a previous article in Nature, is that scientists may in the future create chimeras of two different species as a source of tissues and organs for transplantation. Each day, according to data from the journal Science and Research, an average of 16 people in Europe and 22 in the united States die waiting for an organ replacement.

“It’s a partial success, remarkable though still very far from an application in biomedicine”, explains Lluís Montoliu

The experiments raise ethical controversy very big, because it’s supposed to use other species as a genuine "factories"transplants. Despite the potential therapeutic benefits that might have these studies, it is certain that its realization is not allowed in the united States with federal public funds from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), by which in this country must be carried out with private funding. Although this research is only the first step, each time we are more close to manufacture human organs in animals. Homer never imagined that their monstrous creations could change the medicine.